Each year on May 15, approximately 12.4 million Palestinians around the world commemorate the Nakba, or “catastrophe,” marking the near-total destruction of Palestinian society and the ethnic cleansing that took place in 1948. This date coincides with the establishment of the State of Israel, a process rooted in violence and aimed at creating a Jewish-majority state, as envisioned by the Zionist movement. To achieve this goal, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forcibly expelled from their homeland.
Between 1947 and 1949, at least 750,000 Palestinians—out of a population of 1.9 million—were turned into refugees. Zionist forces seized more than 78 percent of historic Palestine, destroyed around 530 villages and towns, and carried out mass atrocities that resulted in the deaths of approximately 15,000 Palestinians across more than 70 documented massacres.
Although May 15, 1948, is the official date of Nakba remembrance, the campaign of forced displacement had begun well before then. By that day, half of all eventual Palestinian refugees had already been expelled.
Today, Israel continues to oppress and dispossess Palestinians—though through means that are often less overt than those employed during the Nakba.
MASSACRES
DECEMBER 1947 - Balad al-Sheikh
On the night of December 31, 1947, the village of Balad al-Sheikh, situated to the east of Haifa, came under a major assault by the Zionist militia known as the Haganah. This marked one of the earliest large-scale attacks in the lead-up to the Nakba. Historical records, including those cited by Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi, report that between 60 and 70 Palestinian villagers lost their lives in this raid.
The operation was led by approximately 170 fighters from the Palmach, the elite strike force of the Haganah. Their objective, as outlined in internal communications, was to eliminate as many adult males as possible. Armed units opened fire, demolished homes with explosives, and carried out executions of male residents. According to the Haganah’s own account, women and children were among the casualties as well, with at least two women and five children killed, and another 40 people wounded. The scale of destruction also included dozens of homes reduced to rubble.
This act of violence triggered the exodus of numerous families. Many fled within days, and by the end of April 1948, Zionist forces had taken full control of the area.
Before these tragic events, Balad al-Sheikh was a thriving community and, by 1945, ranked as the second most populated village in Palestine. It held great symbolic significance, being the burial site of Izz al-Din al-Qassam, a renowned resistance figure whose death at the hands of British forces in the 1930s helped spark the Arab Revolt. Today, his grave lies neglected in what is now the town of Nesher—a silent witness to a past violently uprooted
JULY 1948 – Lydda
What led to the Nakba?
The origins of the Nakba can be traced back to the rise of Zionism as a political movement in Eastern Europe during the late 19th century. Zionism was rooted in the belief that Jews, regarded as a distinct nation or race, were entitled to a sovereign state of their own.
Beginning in 1882, waves of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe and Russia began arriving in Palestine. Many were fleeing anti-Semitic violence, such as pogroms in the Russian Empire, while others were motivated by the ideals of the Zionist movement. In 1896, Theodor Herzl, an Austrian journalist, gave Zionism a clear ideological framework in his pamphlet Der Judenstaat - The Jewish State -, arguing that the solution to European anti-Semitism was the creation of a Jewish state.
Initially, alternative locations like Uganda and Argentina were considered by early Zionists, but the movement ultimately focused on Palestine, invoking biblical narratives that framed the territory as a divine inheritance. At the time, Jews made up only about 3% of the population in Palestine, and the existing Jewish community - known as the Yishuv - had no political ambitions to establish a state.
Following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, Britain took control of Palestine under the secret Sykes-Picot Agreement with France, dividing former Ottoman lands for imperial gain. In 1917, Britain issued the Balfour Declaration, supporting the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine - a land it did not possess the moral or legal authority to promise. This pledge was heavily influenced by Chaim Weizmann, a prominent Zionist and chemist, whose wartime services had earned him access to the highest levels of the British government.
The British hoped their support for Zionism would gain them favor among Jewish communities in the U.S. and Russia during World War I, and would also strengthen their claim over Palestine in the post-war period. With the British Mandate formally beginning in 1920, Jewish immigration to Palestine surged.
Between 1922 and 1935, the Jewish share of the population increased from 9% to 27%, leading to the displacement of many Palestinian peasants as land was purchased from absentee landlords.
Palestinian and Arab intellectuals had been warning about the colonial intentions of Zionism since at least 1908. The situation escalated during the Nazi rise to power in the 1930s, when tens of thousands of European Jews sought refuge in Palestine. In 1936, mounting tensions sparked the Arab Revolt, a broad Palestinian uprising against both British rule and growing Zionist influence. The British responded with brutal force—demolishing homes, imprisoning thousands in camps, torturing detainees, and exiling nationalist leaders. By the end of the revolt in 1939, about 10% of Palestinian men had been killed, wounded, imprisoned, or exiled.
Concerned by the unrest, Britain made several attempts to curb Jewish immigration, but pressure from Zionist lobbying in London often reversed these efforts. In 1944, as World War II raged and Holocaust survivors sought refuge, several Zionist militias turned against the British, launching violent attacks to protest immigration restrictions. One of the most infamous was the bombing of the King David Hotel in 1946, which killed 91 people and targeted the British administrative headquarters.
In early 1947, Britain announced its intention to withdraw from Palestine and handed the issue over to the newly formed United Nations. On November 29, 1947, the UN passed Resolution 181, proposing the division of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states. At the time, Jews represented only one-third of the population and owned less than 6% of the land, yet the plan allocated them 55% of the territory, including major cities and strategic coastal areas. Palestinians, seeing this as a gross injustice, rejected the proposal.
Palestinian and Arab intellectuals had been warning about the colonial intentions of Zionism since at least 1908. The situation escalated during the Nazi rise to power in the 1930s, when tens of thousands of European Jews sought refuge in Palestine. In 1936, mounting tensions sparked the Arab Revolt, a broad Palestinian uprising against both British rule and growing Zionist influence. The British responded with brutal force—demolishing homes, imprisoning thousands in camps, torturing detainees, and exiling nationalist leaders. By the end of the revolt in 1939, about 10% of Palestinian men had been killed, wounded, imprisoned, or exiled.
Concerned by the unrest, Britain made several attempts to curb Jewish immigration, but pressure from Zionist lobbying in London often reversed these efforts. In 1944, as World War II raged and Holocaust survivors sought refuge, several Zionist militias turned against the British, launching violent attacks to protest immigration restrictions. One of the most infamous was the bombing of the King David Hotel in 1946, which killed 91 people and targeted the British administrative headquarters.
In early 1947, Britain announced its intention to withdraw from Palestine and handed the issue over to the newly formed United Nations. On November 29, 1947, the UN passed Resolution 181, proposing the division of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states. At the time, Jews represented only one-third of the population and owned less than 6% of the land, yet the plan allocated them 55% of the territory, including major cities and strategic coastal areas. Palestinians, seeing this as a gross injustice, rejected the proposal.
APRIL 1948 - Deir Yassin
On April 9, 1948, the village of Deir Yassin, located just west of Jerusalem, witnessed one of the most devastating attacks carried out by Zionist militias during the lead-up to the establishment of Israel. Over 110 Palestinian civilians — including men, women, and children — were killed in a massacre that shocked observers around the world. Contemporary reports, including one from The New York Times, noted that around half of the victims were women and children.
After the assault, survivors were captured and publicly paraded through the streets of Jerusalem’s Old City. Some were later executed at a nearby quarry, while others were taken back to Deir Yassin and killed there. The village, once home to roughly 750 people and composed of 144 houses, was effectively emptied. The event became emblematic of the violence that accompanied the Palestinian exodus in 1948.
Today, the remnants of Deir Yassin have been absorbed into the Israeli urban landscape. A psychiatric hospital was built on part of the village’s original site, and the central area now serves as a bus terminal. In 1949, the settlement of Givat Shaul Bet was established atop the ruins of the village, expanding upon an older neighboring settlement. Further encroachments followed in the early 1980s, with the establishment of Har Nof. According to international law, all such settlements on occupied Palestinian land are considered illegal.
OCTOBER 1948 – Saliha
On October 30, 1948, Israeli forces belonging to the army’s Seventh Brigade carried out a deadly assault on the Palestinian village of Saliha, located in the Upper Galilee near the Lebanese border. According to testimonies cited by both Israel Galili of the Haganah General Staff and historian Benny Morris, soldiers detonated explosives inside a building—reportedly either a house or a mosque—where dozens of villagers had sought shelter. The resulting explosion killed between 60 and 94 people.
Following the massacre, the village was entirely emptied of its inhabitants, with only one structure left standing—likely a former school. Walid Khalidi, in his documentation of depopulated Palestinian villages, describes this remaining building as a long structure with numerous tall windows. Today, the original site of the village has been turned into farmland, where apple orchards now cover the area. Two Israeli communities, Yir’on and Avivim, have since been established on the lands that once belonged to Saliha. Before its destruction, the village was perched on a plain overlooking a steep ravine known as Wadi Saliha. Its location in the mountainous Galilee, close to the Lebanese frontier, gave it both agricultural and strategic significance. According to Salman Abu Sitta’s Atlas of Palestine, by 2008, over 8,000 registered Palestinian refugees traced their origins back to Saliha.
MAY 1948 – Tantura
On the night of May 22–23, 1948, shortly after the declaration of the State of Israel, the coastal Palestinian village of Tantura, located south of Haifa, was attacked and captured by the Alexandroni Brigade of the Israeli army. Following its occupation, dozens of Palestinian civilians—possibly over 200 according to some testimonies—were executed after surrendering. Survivors later recounted that many of the men were gathered, shot, and buried in mass graves.
Between July 9 and 13, 1948, the Palestinian city of Lydda (now Lod) was the site of a major military assault as part of the Israeli operation known as Operation Dani, aimed at capturing both Lydda and the nearby city of Ramla. During this campaign, Zionist forces killed scores of civilians—estimates suggest the death toll may have reached 200, according to Salman Abu Sitta’s Atlas of Palestine. The violence was followed by a mass expulsion that has since been described as one of the most extensive instances of forced displacement during the 1948 war.
The events unfolded in two major phases. First came the armed assault and occupation of the city itself, during which numerous civilians were killed. The second phase consisted of the mass expulsion of the city’s population, a process that scholars and historical sources characterize as a deliberate act of ethnic cleansing. According to the Interactive Encyclopedia of the Palestine Question, the forced displacement of Lydda’s residents was among the most significant "transfer operations" carried out at the time.
Israeli forces, under the command of Yitzhak Rabin, who led operations for the Dani offensive, and with the approval of David Ben-Gurion, expelled an estimated 60,000 to 70,000 people—including residents and refugees from surrounding areas. In one of the most tragic incidents, dozens of Palestinians who had sought refuge in the Dahmash Mosque were killed with automatic gunfire, grenades, and even rocket fire. The death toll inside the mosque alone ranged from 80 to 176, with additional killings reported in other parts of the city.
Those who survived the assault were forced to march toward Ramallah under armed threat. This grueling expulsion—now remembered as the Lydda Death March—claimed the lives of many elderly people, women, and children, who succumbed to thirst, fatigue, and illness along the way.
In the aftermath, Israeli troops looted homes and properties. Eyewitness accounts and archival records indicate widespread theft, with valuables such as money and jewelry taken from civilians. An estimated 1,800 trucks were reportedly filled with looted goods. Resistance was met with deadly force, and several individuals were executed on the spot.